War on Drugs

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The War on Drugs is an initiative undertaken by the United States with the assistance of participating countries, which is intended to "combat" the illegal drug trade —to curb supply and diminish demand for certain psychoactive substances deemed harmful. This initiative is responsible for a set of laws and policies that are intended to discourage the production, distribution, and consumption of targeted substances.

In its broadest sense, the War on Drugs could be considered to have started in 1880, when the U.S. and China completed an agreement (see Opium wars) that prohibited the shipment of opium between the two countries. The United States alcohol prohibition from 1920-1933 is the most widely known historical period of drug prohibition. The term itself, however, was coined in 1971 by Richard Nixon to describe a new set of initiatives designed to enhance drug prohibition.

The philosophy behind drug prohibition is to interfere with the free market production and distribution of a substance to the extent that the cost to the end user exceeds the value of the product, resulting in a widespread discontinuation of use. It also relies upon fear of reprisals and obedience to legal statutes in order to discourage use.

The first recorded instance of the United States enacting a ban on the domestic distribution of drugs is the Harrison Narcotic Act in 1914. This act was presented and passed as a method of regulating the production and distribution of opiate containing substances under the Interstate Trade section of the U.S. Constitution, but a small section of it was later interpreted by enforcement officials to prosecute doctors for prescribing opiates to addicts. Previous to this, similar bans had existed in many individual states, but this was the first federal act of prohibition.

Alcohol prohibition progressed similarly, starting as numerous state-wide bans and eventually culminating into a nationwide constitutional amendment in 1919, having been approved by 36 of the 48 states. This remains the only major act of prohibition to be repealed, having been struck down by a later constitutional amendment in 1933.

In 1937, congress passed the Marijuana Tax Act. Presented as a $1 nuisance tax on the distribution of marijuana, this act required anyone distributing it to maintain and submit a detailed account of his or her transactions, including inspections, affidavits, and private information regarding the parties involved. Punitive measures, such as fines and the threat of imprisonment for persons failing to fulfill their statutory obligations, effectively made the legal distribution of marijuana too great a liability for normal business. This act was passed by Congress on the basis of testimony and public perception that marijuana caused insanity, criminality, and death.

The 1951 Boggs Act increased penalties fourfold; five years later, the 1956 Daniel Act increased penalties by a factor of eight over those specified in the Boggs Act. Although by this time there was adequate testimony to refute the idea that marijuana caused insanity and death, the deliberations for these laws shifted in focus to the proposition that marijuana use led to the use of heroin, creating the gateway theory.

Nixon's modern-day War on Drugs began in 1969. He characterized the abuse of illicit substances as "America's public enemy number one." Under Nixon, the U.S. Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) of 1970. This legislation is the foundation on which the modern drug war exists. Responsibility for enforcement of this new law was given to the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, and then in 1973 to the newly formed Drug Enforcement Administration.

In 1988, towards the close of the Reagan Administration, the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) was created to centrally coordinate legislative, security, diplomatic, research and health policy throughout the government. In recognition of his central role, the director of ONDCP is commonly known as the Drug Czar. The position was raised to cabinet-level status by Bill Clinton in 1993.

Contents 1 Cost 2 Effects 3 United States domestic policy 4 United States foreign policy 5 Criticism 5.1 Legality 5.2 Efficacy 5.3 Hindrance to legitimate research 5.4 Racial inequities in prosecution 5.5 Environmental consequences 5.6 Propaganda cover for paramilitary operations 5.7 Government's war against the people 5.8 War on drugs as cyclic creation of a permanent underclass 5.9 Gateway drug infrastructure 6 Response to criticism 7 References 8 See also 9 External links

Cost

Determining the cost of the War on Drugs is complex. The U.S. government estimates it by calculating the amounts used to attempt to control the supply of illegal drugs, government employees involved in waging the war, and rehabilitation costs. This total was estimated by the U.S. government's cost report on drug control to be roughly 12 billion dollars in 2005. Additionally, in a separate report, the U.S. government reports that the cost of incarcerating drug law offenders was $30.1 billion, $9.1 billion for police protection, $4.5 billion for legal adjudication, and $11.0 billion for state and federal corrections. In total, roughly $45.5 billion was spent in 1995 for these factors.^[1] It should be noted that the socioeconomic costs, as well as the individual costs (i.e. the personal disadvantages in income and career) caused by the incarceration of millions of people are not included in this number.

In comparison, in 1998 the total cost of the drug problem in America was estimated at $143.4 billion.^[2] This number, however, includes socioeconomic costs (the financial disadvantage caused indirectly for society and economy by drug-abuse).

Effects

Drug use has increased in all categories since prohibition.^[3] Since 1937, the use of marijuana has increased from an activity limited to Mexican immigrants and jazz singers ^[4] to being used by 20-37% of the population of the United States.^[3] Between 1972 and 1988 the use of cocaine increased more than fivefold.^[5] The usage patterns of the current two most prevalent drugs, methamphetamine and ecstasy, have shown similar gains.^[3] From the perspective of decreasing the prevalence of the use of drugs, the War on Drugs has had the reverse of its intended effect.

A number of economically depressed Colombian farmers in several remote areas of the country began to turn to what became a new, illicit cash crop for its high resale value and cheap manufacturing process. Local coca cultivation, however, remained comparatively rare in Colombia until the mid-1990s. Drug traffickers originally imported most coca base from traditional producers in Peru and Bolivia for processing in Colombia, until eradication efforts in those countries resulted in a "balloon effect".

Despite the Reagan Administration's high-profile public pronouncements, secretly, many senior officials of the Reagan administration illegally trained and armed the Nicaraguan Contras, which they funded by the shipment of large quantities of cocaine into the United States using U.S. government aircraft and U.S. military facilities.^[6][7]. Funding for the Contras was also obtained through the illegal sale of weaponry to Iran. ^[8][9] When this practice was discovered and condemned in the media, it was referred to as the Iran-Contra affair, but the large cocaine shipments into the US to fund the Administration's illegal foreign policy agenda were much less known.

Another milestone occurred in 1996, when 56% of California voters voted yes to Proposition 215, legalizing the growing and use of marijuana for medical purposes. This created significant legal and policy tensions between the Federal and State governments. Courts have since decided that neither this, nor any similar acts, will protect users from federal prosecution.^{[citation needed]}

Regardless of public opinion, marijuana could be the single most targeted drug in the drug war. It constitutes almost half of all drug arrests, and between 1990-2002, out of the overall drug arrests, 82% of the increase was for marijuana. In this same time period, New York experienced an increase of 2,640% for marijuana possession arrests.^{[citation needed]}

As of 2006, marijuana has become the United States of America's biggest cash crop ^[10]

United States domestic policy

For U.S. public policy purposes, drug abuse is any personal use of a drug contrary to law. The definition includes otherwise legal pharmaceuticals if they are obtained by illegal means or used for non-medicinal purposes. This differs from what mental health professionals classify as drug abuse per the DSM-IV, which is defined as more problematic drug misuse, both of which are different from drug use.

In 1994, it was reported that the War on Drugs incarcerates 1 million Americans a year.^[11] Of the 1 million drug arrests each year, about 225,000 are for simple possession of marijuana, the fourth most common cause of arrest in the United States^[12] In the 1980s, while the number of arrests for all crimes was rising 28 percent, the number of arrests for drug offenses rose 126 percent.^[13] The United States has a higher proportion of its population incarcerated than any other country in the world for which reliable statistics are available — reaching a total of 2.2 million inmates in the in 2005. The US Dept. of Justice, reporting on the effects of state initiatives, has stated that, from 1990 through 2000, "the increasing number of drug offenses accounted for 27% of the total growth among black inmates, 7% of the total growth among Hispanic inmates, and 15% of the growth among white inmates."

United States foreign policy

The United States has also initiated a number of military actions as part of its War on Drugs, such as the 1989 invasion of Panama codenamed Operation Just Cause involving 25,000 American troops. The U.S. alleged that Gen. Manuel Noriega, head of government of Panama, was involved in drug trafficking in Panama. As part of Plan Colombia, the U.S. has funded coca eradication through private contractors such as DynCorp and helped train the Colombian armed forces to eradicate coca and fight left-wing guerrillas such as the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) and right-wing paramilitaries such as the AUC (United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia), both of which have been accused of participating in the illegal drug trade in their areas of influence.

In 2000, the Clinton administration initially waived all but one of the human rights conditions attached to Plan Colombia, considering such aid as crucial to national security at the time.^[14] Subsequently, the U.S. government certified that the Colombian government had taken steps to improve respect for human rights and to prosecute abusers among its security forces.^[15] The U.S. has later denied aid to individual Colombian military units accused of such abuses, such as the Palanquero Air Force base and the Army's XVII Brigade.^[16][17] Opponents of aid given to the Colombian military as part of the War on Drugs argue that the U.S. and Colombian governments primarily focus on fighting the guerrillas, devoting less attention to the paramilitaries although these have a greater degree of participation in the illicit drug industry. Critics argue that Human Rights Watch, congressional committees and other entities have documented the existence of connections between members of the Colombian military and the AUC, and that Colombian military personnel have committed human rights abuses which would make them ineligible for U.S. aid under current laws.

In January 2007, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales met in Mexico with his counterpart Eduardo Medina-Mora Icaza to discuss ways to stem growing drug-related violence in Mexican border towns associated with the illegal drug trade to America. More than 2,000 Mexicans died in gangland-style killings in 2006, prompting a petition by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to open new offices in Nuevo Laredo, Matamoros, and Nogales. The requested expansion would bring the total number of Mexican offices to 11 and increase the number of DEA agents from 81 to nearly 100.^[18]

Criticism

The War on Drugs has been criticized for a variety of reasons.

Legality

In his essay The Drug War and the Constitution ^[19], Libertarian philosopher Paul Hager makes the case that the War on Drugs in the United States is an illegal form of prohibition, which violates the principles of a limited government embodied in the Constitution. Alcohol prohibition required amending the Constitution, because this was not a power granted to the federal government. Hager asserts if this is true, then marijuana prohibition should likewise require a Constitutional amendment.

In her dissent in Gonzales v. Raich, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor argued that drug prohibition is an improper usurpation of the power to regulate interstate commerce, and the power to prohibit should be reserved by the states. In the same case, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a stronger dissent expressing the similar idea.

Efficacy

Richard Davenport-Hines, in his book The Pursuit of Oblivion (W.W. Norton & Company, 2001), criticized the efficacy of the War on Drugs by pointing out:

10-15 per cent of illicit heroin and 30 per cent of illicit cocaine is intercepted. Drug traffickers have gross profit margins of up to 300 per cent. At least 75 per cent of illicit drug shipments would have to be intercepted before the traffickers' profits were hurt.

Alberto Fujimori, president of Peru from 1990-2000, described U.S. foreign drug policy as "failed" on grounds that "for 10 years, there has been a considerable sum invested by the Peruvian government and another sum on the part of the American government, and this has not led to a reduction in the supply of coca leaf offered for sale. Rather, in the 10 years from 1980 to 1990, it grew 10-fold."^[20]

Critics often note that during alcohol prohibition, alcohol use initially fell but began to increase as early as 1922. It's been extrapolated that even if prohibition hadn't been repealed in 1933, alcohol consumption would have quickly surpassed pre-prohibition levels [2]. They argue that the War on Drugs uses similar measures and is no more effective. In the six years from 2000-2006, the USA spent $4.7 billion on "Plan Colombia", an effort to eradicate coca production in South America. The main result of this effort was to shift coca production into more remote areas, the overall acreage cultivated for coca in Colombia at the end of the six years was the same, and cultivation in the neighbouring countries of Peru and Bolivia actually increased. ^[21]

Similar lack of efficacy is observed in other countries pursuing similar policies. In 1994, 28.5% of Canadians reported having consumed illicit drugs in their life; by 2004, that figure had risen to 45%. 73% of the $368 million spent by the Canadian government on targeting illicit drugs in 2004-2005 went toward law enforcement rather than treatment, prevention or harm reduction. ^[22]

Except for high-dependency drugs (such as heroin, cocaine, crack, etc.) there is little correlation between the use of drugs and crime, except in so far as the possession and cultivation of drugs are crimes.^{[citation needed]}

Hindrance to legitimate research

The scientific community has criticized U.S. drug policy as being "outdated,"^[23] and a hindrance to legitimate medical and scientific research efforts. For example, the U.S. government's classification of marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug (having no medicinal value) is contradicted by the journal Nature Medicine ^[24]:

"the endocannabinoid system has an important role in nearly every important paradigm of pain, in memory, in neurodegeneration and in inflammation;" although this quote refers to endogenous cannabinoids (cannabinoids made from the body itself and not taken in from the outside of the body), research on cannabinoids from secondary sources such as the cannabis plant has shown them to have legitimate medical uses.

Racial inequities in prosecution

The social consequences of the drug war have been widely criticized by such organizations as the American Civil Liberties Union as being racially biased against minorities and disproportionately responsible for the exploding United States prison population. According to a report commissioned by the Drug Policy Alliance, and released in March 2006 by the Justice Policy Institute, America's "Drug-Free Zones" are ineffective at keeping youths away from drugs, and instead create strong racial disparities in the judicial system.^[25]

Environmental consequences

Environmental consequences of the drug war, resulting from US-backed aerial fumigation of drug-growing operations in third world countries, have been criticized as detrimental to some of the world's most fragile ecosystems^[26]; the same aerial fumigation practices are further credited with causing health problems in local populations ^[27].

Propaganda cover for paramilitary operations

The epithet "War on Drugs" has been condemned as being propaganda to justify military or paramilitary operations under the guise of a noble cause; in particular, Noam Chomsky points out that the term is an example of synecdoche referring to operations against suspected producers, traders and/or users of certain substances. This form of language is similar to that used in other initiatives such as Lyndon B. Johnson's "war on poverty" and George W. Bush's "War on Terrorism". The word "war" is used to invoke a state of emergency, although the target of the war isn't anything against which standard military tactics are effective.

Government's war against the people

In their book Multitude, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri oppose the view that the use of the term "war" is only metaphorical: they analyse the War on Drugs as part of a global war of a biopolitical nature. Like the War on Terrorism, the War on Drugs is a true war, waged by the US government against its own people.^[28]

War on drugs as cyclic creation of a permanent underclass

Since illegal drug use has been blamed for feeding the growth of the underclass, this has caused prohibitionists to call for further increases in certain drug-crime penalties, even though some of these disrupt opportunities for drug users to advance in society in socially acceptable ways. It has been argued by Blumenson and Nilsen that this causes a vicious cycle: since penalties for drug crimes among youth almost always involve semi-permanent removal from opportunities for education, and later involve creation of criminal records which make employment far more difficult, that the "war on drugs" has in fact resulted in the creation of a permanent underclass of people who have few education or job opportunities, often as a result of being punished for drug offenses which in turn have resulted from attempts to earn a living in spite of having no education or job opportunities.^[29]

Gateway drug infrastructure

Illegal drugs that are perceived as being less dangerous tend to gain more widespread popularity than drugs perceived as more dangerous. An example would be the relationship of marijuana, seen as a less dangerous drug, and crack cocaine, seen as a more dangerous drug. People are more willing to experiment with marijuana than crack because the consequences are less severe. But because both are illegal, both require a black market infrastructure for distribution. Because marijuana is popular, it creates a network of people for this black market distribution infrastructure that is larger than would be present if only crack were illegal, and marijuana were legal. In this manner, the criminalization of multiple drugs serve as a gateway of access to those drugs which are seen as more dangerous.

Response to criticism

A common argument heard in support of the War on Drugs is that the war is not something that can be "won" or "lost." This argument states that the War on Drugs is much similar to our medical efforts to end human disease--both have technically "failed" to an extent, however, very few people will argue that we should end all our funding of medical research on the basis that it hasn't 100% succeeded in curing illness. This argument implies that while there are negative effects from the War on Drugs, the alternate, legalization, would lead to an even worse state in society.

The weakness of this metaphor is that modern medicine has and continues to make great progress in the treatment of illness, whereas the War of Drugs has been, at best, unsuccessful. This weakness is exacerbated by the logical problems in likening all drugs to fatal diseases. For some drugs, like methamphetamines, the argument holds better. For others, such as cannabis, this is not so. This line of reasoning is further complicated by those who argue that the same "medical" argument should apply towards the prohibition of alcohol, which is commonly understood to be acceptable in moderation, despite its harms.

Although legalization of drugs would reduce criminal activity simply by redefinition, advocates of prohibition claim that increasing the availability of drugs will increase usage, and that the social costs of increased drug addiction would be worse than the costs of prohibition. ^[30]However, this claim overlooks the fact that various drugs can be legal but their availability can be regulated to various degrees based on their public health risk. For example, morphine, alcoholic beverages and caffeine-laced soft drinks are all legal but regulated differently which greatly influences their availability to the general public. The War on Drugs surrenders control over certain drugs to an illegal drug market dominated by violent gangs and drug dealers, which makes it virtually impossible to regulate them. This absence of regulation creates a whole new set of public health and safety problems when certain widely-used drugs that pose relatively little harm to individual user or society, such as cannabis, are exploited by drug dealers who desire only to increase their profit by exposing more of the public to hard drugs, such as methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin.

Prohibitionists also point out that the cheapest, most popular legal drug, namely alcohol, is responsible for a larger proportion of crime than all illicit drugs combined, indicating that legalization of other drugs would indeed lead to an increase in crime.^[31] However, this argument results from the false presumption that all drugs exert the same effects. While alcohol may promote violence and crime, there is no evidence to suggest that other drugs, psychedelics or opioids for instance, directly induce violent behavior. Criminalization of theft and other crimes has not led to their eradication, but few would suggest that crimes of person and property be legalized. Analogously, prohibitionists argue that the failure of the war on drugs to reduce drug use should not be taken as a reason to legalize it. Although advocates of legalization would argue that this is a false analogy, and that that drug use only disadvantages the user, prohibitionists point to the effects of drug use upon others.^[30] In response to that point, advocates of legalization would point out that tobacco and alcohol have the same effects as other illegal drugs (intoxication) and can lead to the same end (addiction, disease, social problems, death) and are still legal, so therefore the government is contradicting itself by making certain substances illegal when the legal ones have the same effects.

References

See also

• Above the Influence
• Arguments for and against drug prohibition
• Decriminalization
• Demand reduction
• Drug Policy Reform
• Harm reduction
• Gary Webb
• Illegal drug trade
• Just Say No
• Law Enforcement Against Prohibition
• Legal issues of cannabis
• Legalization
• Lin Zexu
• Marijuana Policy Project
• Norml
• Office of National Drug Control Policy
• Operation Pseudo Miranda
• Opium War
• Perpetual war
• Police misconduct
• Prison-industrial complex
• Prohibition (drugs)
• Students for Sensible Drug Policy
• Supremacy Clause
• United Nations Drug Control Programme
• USA v. $124,700 August 18, 2006

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